The Republican Thread

[retro1983hat]

I saw Lindsay Lohan complaining about McCain and promoting Obama. Last time around, Kerry had all the celebrities stumping for him

I firmly believe that with every celebrity that backs a candidate, that person loses votes. It's almost as if "Lindsay Lohan thinks it's right, it must be wrong."

 

That and what really makes a celebrity knowledgable about politics? Honestly, how many of these Left Coasters know anything about the issues.

[BigSqwert]

I saw Lindsay Lohan complaining about McCain and promoting Obama. Last time around, Kerry had all the celebrities stumping for him

I firmly believe that with every celebrity that backs a candidate, that person loses votes. It's almost as if "Lindsay Lohan thinks it's right, it must be wrong."

 

That and what really makes a celebrity knowledgable about politics? Honestly, how many of these Left Coasters know anything about the issues.

Rosario Dawson was at the GOP convention. And Ted Nugent is still a dickwad.

[BigSqwert]

Oh yeah...that anorexic girl from The Hills (I think that's the show) is a big McCain fan.

[whitesoxfan101]

People who watch MTV AND are old enough to vote (aka, are 18 or older and out of high school) are mostly dumbasses and people who won't vote anyways. They did the same stuff four years ago for John Kerry, and it didn't work then either. Most celebrities are dumbasses too (I think we can ALL agree on that), so it's best to ignore what they think on anything important.

 

And yet McCain/Palin wants the government to tell women what to do with their bodies.

 

I'm not going to give a rebuttal for this statement, other than voting Obama/Biden is much more of a statement that you like being told to do than is voting McCain/Palin.

Edited September 8, 2008 by whitesoxfan101

[EvilMonkey]

Obama identified one of the 7 states he thought existed that nobody else knew about! New Pennsylvania! I wonder if that is next to New Ohio? Anyone know what the capitol is of New Pennsylvania?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AuysikG55Ks

[BigSqwert]

Obama identified one of the 7 states he thought existed that nobody else knew about! New Pennsylvania! I wonder if that is next to New Ohio? Anyone know what the capitol is of New Pennsylvania?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AuysikG55Ks

I think it borders Czechoslovakia.

[juddling]

And I feel most sorry for that poor teenaged father. Boy. One minute, he’s just a teenaged lad in Alaska having joyful, unprotected sex. And the next minute: Get to the Republican convention. I think that is the best safe sex message of all time. Use a condom or become Republican! …That boy will spend the rest of his life masturbating while wearing a condom."

 

 

In my best Larry the Cable Guy voice--"I don't care who you are....that's funny"

[lostfan]

I saw Lindsay Lohan complaining about McCain and promoting Obama. Last time around, Kerry had all the celebrities stumping for him

I firmly believe that with every celebrity that backs a candidate, that person loses votes. It's almost as if "Lindsay Lohan thinks it's right, it must be wrong."

 

That and what really makes a celebrity knowledgable about politics? Honestly, how many of these Left Coasters know anything about the issues.

The same thing that makes you and me knowledgeable about politics, except nobody knows who we are.

Edited September 8, 2008 by lostfan

[Balta1701]

The same thing that makes you and me knowledgeable about politics, except nobody knows who we are.

Well that, and they are also much more able to afford things like max political contributions and lobbyists of their own than most of us.

[EvilMonkey]

VP wannabe Joe and the 2nd amendment.

[Steff]

Oh yeah...that anorexic girl from The Hills (I think that's the show) is a big McCain fan.

 

 

Heidi, though apparently she isn't registered to vote. Kirstin Dunst was at the Dem Convention and got photographed s***faced. If they do have any impact I bet it's not good.

[Cknolls]

Rasmussen: "While 82% of voters who support McCain believe the justices should rule on what is in the Constitution, just 29% of Barack Obama’s supporters agree." Their preferred metric? "the judge's sense of fairness."

 

 

That is scary.

[mr_genius]

looks like McCains convention speech may have won over some independents

 

http://www.gallup.com/poll/110137/McCain-N...dependents.aspx

[Cknolls]

Anyone wanting a sense of how Sarah Palin will handle herself in interviews should take a look at this long C-SPAN interview from February (in three parts: first, second, third). (H/T Marc Ambinder)

 

It is of course somewhat Alaska-focused but it’s quite substantive on policy questions, including those that go well beyond state politics. She talks about changes in Medicaid rules, about unfunded mandates, about energy policy, tax policy, environmental issues, and more.

 

For a little sense of her style, here is an answer to the question of who counts as wealthy, which John McCain answered rather clumsily last month. Palin did better:

 

Q: Part of the debate governor has been where do you define middle or upper income families. Is it $75,000, is it $50,000 is it $100,000 or above? Where would you draw the line between middle and upper income when it comes to taxes?

 

A: Well that's a great question because it is so subjective. For us in Alaska the cost of living is quite high so someone making maybe $80,000 in Alaska maybe isn't categorized as wealthy, but maybe that same family making that income in a state where the cost of living is much lower that would be considered wealthy. So that's a tough call but my general philosophy is one of being fiscally conservative and not wanting to see the federal government take more and more of individuals' paychecks.

 

 

[NorthSideSox72]

looks like McCains convention speech may have won over some independents

 

http://www.gallup.com/poll/110137/McCain-N...dependents.aspx

Now THAT is meaningful poll data. Big win for McCain, for the time being.

 

[southsider2k5]

A couple of other interesting things I didn't see mentioned here is that Obama has 40 fund raising stops planned in 30 days, while McCain is essentially free to campaign all he wants.

 

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/09/us/polit...amp;oref=slogin

 

Straining to Reach Goal, Obama Presses Donors

Jacob Silberberg for The New York Times

 

By MICHAEL LUO and JEFF ZELENY

Published: September 8, 2008

 

After months of record-breaking fund-raising, a new sense of urgency in Senator Barack Obama’s fund-raising team is palpable as the full weight of the campaign’s decision to bypass public financing for the general election is suddenly upon it.

 

Senator Barack Obama, who spoke Monday in Flint, Mich., has bypassed federal financing, giving him more freedom but requiring continuing fund-raising.

 

Pushing a fund-raiser later this month, a finance staff member sent a sharply worded note last week to Illinois members of its national finance committee, calling their recent efforts “extremely anemic.”

 

At a convention-week meeting in Denver of the campaign’s top fund-raisers, buttons with the image of a money tree were distributed to those who had already contributed the maximum $2,300 to the general election, a subtle reminder to those who had failed to ante up.

 

The signs of concern have become evident in recent weeks as early fund-raising totals have suggested that Mr. Obama’s decision to bypass public financing may not necessarily afford him the commanding financing advantage over Senator John McCain that many had originally predicted.

 

Presidential candidates in a general election have typically relied on two main sources of money: public financing, along with additional money their parties raise. In choosing to accept the public money, the McCain campaign now gets an $84 million cash infusion from the United States Treasury. Mr. McCain is barred from raising any more money for his own campaign coffers but can lean on money raised by the Republican National Committee, which has continued to exceed expectations.

 

Meanwhile, Obama campaign officials had calculated that with its vaunted fund-raising machine, driven by both small contributors over the Internet and a powerful high-dollar donor network, it made more sense to forgo public financing so they could raise and spend unlimited sums.

 

But the campaign is struggling to meet ambitious fund-raising goals it set for the campaign and the party. It collected in June and July far less from Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton’s donors than originally projected. Moreover, Mr. McCain, unlike Mr. Obama, will have the luxury of concentrating almost entirely on campaigning instead of raising money, as Mr. Obama must do.

 

The Obama campaign does not have to report its August fund-raising totals until next week, so it is difficult to tally what it has in the bank at this point. A spokesman said that August was its best fund-raising month yet and that the campaign’s fund-raising was on track. But the campaign finished July with slightly less cash on hand with the Democratic National Committee compared with Mr. McCain and the R.N.C. The Obama campaign has also been spending heavily, including several million more than the McCain campaign in advertising in August.

 

A California fund-raiser familiar with the party’s August performance estimated that it raised roughly $17 million last month, a drop-off from the previous month, and finished with just $13 million in the bank.

 

Still, the Obama campaign said last Thursday that it had raised $10 million over the Internet in the 24 hours after the speech by Mr. McCain’s running mate, Gov. Sarah Palin, at the Republican convention on Wednesday, a one-day record for the campaign.

 

David Plouffe, the Obama campaign manager, said the majority of the Obama campaign’s donors during the primary had yet to write checks for the general election. When they do, he said, it will be the equivalent of the large injection of cash the McCain campaign is receiving from the government — about $70 million or $80 million.

 

“We’re confident that we will meet our financial goals, but it’s hard work,” Mr. Plouffe said. “We have a long way to go in the next six weeks.”

 

Members of Mr. Obama’s national finance committee were briefed during the convention in Denver by Mr. Plouffe. Penny Pritzker, the Obama finance chairwoman, announced new state-by-state fund-raising goals. The decidedly business-oriented nature of the meeting reflected the burden on the Obama campaign in the coming weeks.

 

“I think McCain made the right call,” said Scott Reed, a Republican strategist who managed Bob Dole’s presidential campaign in 1996. “The Republican National Committee is strong. They have the resources to make this race almost financially on par.”

 

Democratic strategists disagree, pointing out that campaign finance rules impose serious restrictions on Mr. McCain’s ability to fully make use of his party’s bank account.

 

“It’s not just the limitation of dollars when you accept public financing, it’s the limitations that go with that spending,” said Tad Devine, a senior strategist for Senator John Kerry’s presidential campaign in 2004. Mr. Devine added that choosing to accept public financing was the Kerry campaign’s single biggest mistake because it limited the campaign’s resources.

 

The McCain campaign had by far its best fund-raising month ever in August, when it collected $47 million for its coffers and $22 million for the party, finishing the month with more than $100 million in the bank that will now be at the disposal of the R.N.C., according to several finance officials.

 

McCain fund-raisers said they also hope to raise an additional $100 million for the party in September and in October, taking advantage of the sizable contribution limits for the party. The party’s Internet fund-raising has also picked up significantly since the announcement that Ms. Palin would join the Republican ticket. Combined with the $84 million from public financing, that would leave the McCain campaign with about $300 million at its disposal.

 

A recent e-mail message to McCain fund-raisers unveiled new incentives to spur them in their final push. For the primary, anyone who raised $100,000 or more earned the title of Trailblazer, while those who raised $250,000 or more became Innovators. Now Trailblazers who raise another $100,000 for the party for the general election can become Super-Trailblazers, and Innovators who raise another $250,000 earn the title of Super-Innovators.

 

Officials have also sketched out plans for Ms. Palin to do some 35 fund-raisers over the next two months. Mr. McCain will be dispatched for only four major fund-raisers: one on Monday night in Chicago, in which the party raised about $4 million; another next week in Miami, then Los Angeles and New York in October, finance officials said.

 

But even if the McCain finance team, led by Lewis M. Eisenberg, a former Goldman Sachs executive, and Wayne L. Berman, a Washington lobbyist, meets its goals, the campaign will have complete control over only the $84 million from the federal government, as well as $19 million in party money that is permitted to be used in coordination with the campaign.

 

The Republican Party can spend unlimited amounts of its money independent of the McCain campaign. It can also split the costs of so-called hybrid advertisements with the campaign, commercials that must promote not only Mr. McCain but also other Republicans down the ticket, something media strategists said could be ineffective when trying to create a cohesive message. Nevertheless, McCain fund-raisers pointed out the pressure is now on the Obama campaign to raise far more than it ever has before.

 

The Obama campaign set a goal in mid-June of raising $300 million for the campaign and about $150 million for the Democratic Party over four-and-a-half months, fund-raisers said. As of the end of July, however, the Obama campaign was well short of the $100 million a month pace it had set, taking in about $77 million between the campaign and the party that month.

 

It is not yet clear whether the Obama campaign will be able to ratchet up its fund-raising enough in the final two months of the campaign to make up the difference.

 

Even Mr. Obama’s fund-raisers in Illinois were admonished in an e-mail message last Thursday to step up their efforts to “show the other regions that his home state still has it.” The donors, who were also reminded they had each promised to collect $300,000 for the campaign, were asked to raise $25,000 each for an event on Sept. 22 at a Chicago museum.

 

The new state-by-state goals unveiled by campaign officials in Denver stunned at least some in the room and included sizable increases for at least some states, according to interviews with several Obama fund-raisers.

 

The campaign has created a fund-raising committee, the Campaign for Change, which allows fund-raisers to harvest additional checks of more than $30,000 that will then be divvied up among state Democratic Parties in 18 battleground states, with Florida, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Michigan receiving the most.

 

In a campaign swing through South Florida over Labor Day weekend, Mr. Obama’s vice-presidential running mate, Senator Joseph R. Biden Jr., met with several small groups of major donors and sent out an e-mail appeal to supporters of his own unsuccessful presidential campaign, as well as to Jewish supporters. The effort brought in more than $1 million in four days.

 

Campaign officials expect their Internet fund-raising engine to ramp up as the election approaches. And they hope that much of the high-dollar fund-raising can be done without Mr. Obama. In the New York area alone, there are some 18 events planned in September, all with surrogates, including Mrs. Clinton, Caroline Kennedy and Gov. Bill Richardson of New Mexico.

 

But campaign officials conceded that Mr. Obama inevitably will have to make some appearances. On Friday night in New Jersey, Mr. Obama devoted five hours for two fund-raising events, including one at the home of the singer Jon Bon Jovi, in which the ticket was $30,800 a person. Mr. Obama is also scheduled to appear at back-to-back fund-raisers in Los Angeles on Sept. 16.

[Cknolls]

 

Sen. Joe Biden (D-Del.) says that if Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin ® becomes the first female vice president it will be a "backward step for women."

 

 

 

Keep it up, Joe.

[Cknolls]

Still waiting for Obama to cite when he went against the Dems and fought for something his party was against, or reached across the aisle.

[whitesoxfan101]

Still waiting for Obama to cite when he went against the Dems and fought for something his party was against, or reached across the aisle.

 

Hard to cite an example of something that's never happened. My guess is if one of the Obamatrons sees our posts in here, they'll post some BS with some nonsense links attached as "examples", but it's realistically never happened.

Edited September 9, 2008 by whitesoxfan101

[Cknolls]

The gift that keeps on giving:

 

Joe Biden’s comment today, suggesting some contradiction between support for those born with developmental disabilities and opposition to embryo-destructive research is among his more appalling and insulting gaffes to date. As CBS reports it, Biden said:

 

I hear all this talk about how the Republicans are going to work in dealing with parents who have both the joy, because there's joy to it as well, the joy and the difficulty of raising a child who has a developmental disability, who were born with a birth defect. Well guess what folks? If you care about it, why don't you support stem cell research?

 

When asked whether this was an implicit reference to Sarah Palin’s son with Down syndrome, Biden’s press secretary put out this statement:

 

This is a clash of policies not a clash of personalities. We've heard not a dime's worth of difference between the McCain-Palin ticket and the Bush Administration on medical breakthroughs that millions of parents and doctors believe could save lives and transform the quality of life for countless Americans.

 

Where to begin? First of all, the example Palin sets in how she and her family have welcomed her Down syndrome child points in precisely the opposite direction from Biden’s call for the destruction of human embryos for research: it points toward a society that treats every human life as deserving of protection and regard. It is the very reason to oppose embryo-destructive research.

 

Second, while stem cell work, including embryonic stem cell research, can help in the study of human development in general, as a matter of basic science, the notion that it offers a path to the treatment of Down syndrome or other developmental disabilities is just not sound. The basic science (which at its edges could have some impact on the study of developmental disabilities) can be and has been pursued under the Bush administration’s stem cell policy, and even the most adamant advocates of the policies Biden has supported have not listed a cure for Down syndrome among the miracles they promise. Biden’s remark is indicative of the lack of seriousness with which some Democratic politicians treat the relevant science here: they don’t themselves think this is one avenue of cell biology that could offer important help in one range of potential biomedical advances but rather they see it as a kind of magic bullet and universal cure-all that allows them to be for curing all that ails the human race and accusing their opponents of being against it all, meanwhile paying no heed to ethical concerns.

 

Third, to the statement from Biden’s press secretary. I certainly think it would be nice if there were no daylight between McCain and Bush on stem cells, but in fact John McCain voted to overturn the president’s stem cell policy, just like Joe Biden did. Unlike Biden or Obama, though, he has been very eager to encourage new advances in cell biology that could well make the entire debate moot, by making available the benefits derived from embryonic stem cells but without the need for embryos, and so with no ethical concerns. McCain is well informed about these advances, and has suggested they could change the balance of moral goods involved in the stem cell debate. He wants a solution that could advance medical research without undermining our society’s commitment to human equality or dignity. Joe Biden seems just to want a political weapon, and seems not to know much about the subject.

 

The Obama campaign is now backing away from Biden’s insulting remark, and especially arguing that it has nothing to do with Sarah Palin (despite the obvious contextual evidence to the contrary). The Democrats have been hoping for a gaffe from a VP candidate, but this isn’t the gaffe, or the candidate, they had in mind

 

[DrunkBomber]

Still waiting for Obama to cite when he went against the Dems and fought for something his party was against, or reached across the aisle.

Why would he have had to? Theres no corruption in Illinois politics.

[EvilMonkey]

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0908/13319.html

The most ethical congress ever! Wanna bet she holds off on naming a successor long enough so that Rangel's case doesn't come up until after the elections?

 

Pelosi: Rangel won't be forced aside

By JOHN BRESNAHAN & PATRICK O'CONNOR | 9/10/08 4:27 AM EST Text Size:

 

Hoping to put the Democrats’ “culture of corruption” argument to work for themselves, House Republicans on Tuesday called on House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) to remove Rep. Charles B. Rangel (D-N.Y.) from his post as chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee.

 

Pelosi said she has no intention of forcing Rangel to step aside, and the chairman made it clear that he’s not going anywhere on his own.

 

“Charlie Rangel is a very distinguished member of the House of Representatives,” Pelosi said in a brief interview Monday. “Whatever the leaders on their side say, he is very well-respected by members on both sides of the aisle.”

 

Rangel offered no direct comment on the GOP attempt to topple him but said he would “rely on the thinking of Speaker Pelosi.”

 

Rangel has been battered by a series of recent stories questioning his use of rent-stabilized apartments in Harlem as well as his efforts to raise money for the Charles B. Rangel Center for Public Service at the City College of New York. And last week, the New York Post reported that Rangel had failed to declare $75,000 in rental income from a vacation home he owns in the Dominican Republic.

 

While none of these revelations has become a full-blown scandal for Rangel, their cumulative impact has caused a political problem for Democrats. House Republicans have been trying to turn Rangel’s ethics problems into a campaign issue, calling on Democratic incumbents and challengers to return the hundreds of thousands of dollars he has donated to them this cycle.

 

House Minority Leader John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) and other GOP leaders offered a resolution to censure Rangel on the floor in July, but even some Republicans voted against it. The Republican leaders’ calls for Rangel’s ouster from the Ways and Means chairmanship amounts to a second bite at the apple.

 

“Given Chairman Rangel’s continuing ethical lapses, he cannot effectively carry out his duties as chairman of the Ways and Means Committee,” the GOP leadership wrote in its letter to Pelosi. “You, as the speaker of the House, must insist that Rep. Rangel step down from his Ways and Means chairmanship pending an investigation of his ethical lapses.”

 

One top House Democrat, speaking on the condition of anonymity, suggested Democrats might replace Rangel if Republicans forced out Republican Reps. Jerry Lewis of California and Don Young of Alaska, ranking members on the Appropriations and Natural Resources committees.

 

Lewis was investigated by the Justice Department over his ties to a Republican lobbyist, while Young has come under FBI scrutiny over connections to imprisoned K Street influence peddler Jack Abramoff.

 

Neither man was charged with any wrongdoing.

 

Rangel has tried to pre-empt a crisis by asking the ethics committee to investigate the allegations leveled against him. But the panel lost its chairwoman when Rep. Stephanie Tubbs Jones (D-Ohio) died last month, and Pelosi has declined to name a replacement until the House can hold a memorial service.

 

Sources said Pelosi may name a new chairman later this week, with Rep. Gene Green (D-Texas) being the most likely pick.

 

A top Democratic leadership aide said Republicans must allow the Rangel matter to go before the ethics committee before the House takes any action against him. “This thing has to be adjudicated,” said the aide. “This is not the Wild West. He deserves to have the ethics committee look at this first.”

 

That process could take some time. If Pelosi appoints Green as the new ethics chairman, she’ll need to name another Democrat to the panel to replace him. The committee would then have to vote to create a special investigative subcommittee to spearhead any Rangel probe. With Election Day less than two months away, it is highly unlikely that the subcommittee would complete its investigation before the end of the year, meaning the issue would carry over to the 111th Congress.

 

 

[Cknolls]

From NRO:

Geez, give the guy a break. So Obama can't tell the difference between pigs and pit bulls. So what? It's not like he can't distinguish between a domestic terrorist and some guy who lives in the neighborhood, a fetus and an infant born alive or the lunatic leader of a terrorist state and a reasonable statesman

Edited September 10, 2008 by Cknolls

[Cknolls]

Gutfeld on Palin

 

Pretty funny:

 

Perhaps, she truly is the devil in a dress, a ghoul that eats children and pollutes the planet and possibly beats Barack Obama, the patron saint of every customer buying wheat germ in bulk at GNC.

 

But I know the real reason why every single elitist media type is terrified of her. They've never met her. And by "her," I don't mean Sarah Palin. I mean "her", an actual normal woman with a bunch of kids, an average husband and no desire to watch "The L Word."

 

She's scary to these folks the way Wal-Mart is scary to them: Both are alien to someone who blogs about their chakras. They won't go there, because they've never been there.

 

To them, hating Sarah Palin is a symptom of larger bigotry against the rest of us, the normal. If they saw her at a party, they would wonder how she got in. She's the anti-Obama, the anti-New York Times, the anti-everything that Tim Robbins loves, which is why I love her — and you should too.

Edited September 11, 2008 by Cknolls

[BigSqwert]

A woman who shoots wolves out of an airplane and doesn't believe in evolution is normal ?

Edited September 11, 2008 by BigSqwert